Tsunami Disaster Relief:
CHF International implemented the Permanent Housing Assistance for Sri Lanka (PHASe 2) and Recovery Assistance for Southern Sri Lanka (RASSL) programs to assist with immediate humanitarian relief in Sri Lanka, by providing affected communities with shelter and access to latrines and potable water, to help mitigate a public health epidemic. Both programs worked in the Galle and Matara districts, where an estimated 16,000 vulnerable people were affected by the tsunami. RASSL provided more than 1,000 families with transitional shelter solutions, allowed entrepreneurs to regain their livelihoods through equipment and cash grants, and completed 66 quick impact projects, which led to immediate solutions related to schools, playgrounds, and roads and infrastructure, among others. PHASe 2 went one step further by providing safe, permanent shelter to 700 affected families and access to basic services, including water, sanitation, and electricity.

Hospital Reconstruction:
When constructed in 1967, the Thelipalai Government Hospital was seen as a model for the country. It served as a base hospital for Jaffna District and provided psychiatric services for all of Jaffna, and the north of Sri Lanka. In June 1990, however, due to internal conflict, the hospital was vacated and remained off-limits. Following the government’s successful attempts to have the Sri Lankan Army’s High Security Zone moved in 2001, CHF International began rebuilding the hospital, with funding assistance from the US Agency for International Development’s Office of Transition Initiatives. CHF is rehabilitating the hospital’s mental health wing and numerous rooms, and is constructing and furnishing the psychiatric, occupational therapy, OB-GYN and pediatric wards.

Improving water and sanitation for vulnerable returnees:
Sri Lanka’s longstanding problems with waste management have been exacerbated by the return of internally displaced persons in Jaffna, resulting in poor water quality. The overall goal of the program is two-fold: (1) to undertake 300 interventions that provide sustainable disposal of sanitary waste for impoverished rural and urban returnee households; and, (2) to provide information to 1,000%20 families in Jaffna regarding the treatment of water, over extraction and contamination of water in the District.

Previous shelter programs:
From August through December 2003, CHF implemented the Jaffna Welfare Centers - Transitional Shelter Pilot Project, funded by UNHCR. The program provided assistance to 679 families (2,730 individuals) occupying 21 IDP welfare centers in the Jaffna District.  Four-hundred thirty-two of these families received ‘transitional shelter’ units constructed of materials including concrete posts, timber for the roofing framework, doors, sheet roofing, and cement floors.  These light weight but robust structures, with no permanent foundations can be de-fabricated relocated to permanent locations when circumstances permit. From June to August 2004, CHF implemented the Jaffna Welfare Centers Upgrade Program, funded by USAID/OTI. This program provided transitional shelter units to 219 families, and water/sanitation assistance to 652 IDP families (2,551 individuals) occupying 14 welfare centers in Jaffna District.